Eleven months later and just days after the 47th annual CMA Awards
, the two are seated backstage in Greenville, S.C., on their very own headlining tour. They told CMT Hot 20 Countdown
they’re still processing the year’s events, including two CMA trophies.

“It’s been an awesome last couple days,” Tyler Hubbard said. “It’s been a non-stop celebration for BK [Brian Kelley] and myself and the whole FGL team. We’re out here playing shows and getting to celebrate every night, so it’s good. It’s such an honor to even be at the CMAs … but to take home a couple awards was unbelievable.”

With their monumental success and growing momentum, Hubbard and Kelley knew the time had come to take their own show on the road. They kicked off their Here’s to the Good Times tour in early October.

“Our fans have been asking for it for a while,” said Kelley. “They gave us an amazing year, and it just felt, momentum-wise, that it was time. We started playing earlier this year, and we didn’t have any idea how big it was going to be.

“The venues kept changing and the building sizes kept getting bigger and the production felt like every week we kept adding more. We were only supposed to have one semi, and now we have three, and we have three buses. It’s a testament to our hard work and a testament to our fans and our amazing team that’s making it roll. It’s awesome.”

And each night as the curtain drops to the roar of thousands of screaming fans, Kelley and Hubbard know there are few greater experiences.

“It’s truly amazing to see the whole crowd at once,” Hubbard admitted. “Then it’s fun during the show, you kind of single people out. … What we love is, everybody is so happy. Everybody’s having fun and that’s what it’s all about. For that couple of hours, everybody lets loose and forgets their worries and just comes to have a good time and laugh and yell and have a drink.

“It’s fun to see these smiling faces out there that are just so happy and singing every word. It definitely makes it worth. All the hard work definitely pays off in that moment, it’s cool.”